Because it bases its assesments on job title, location and industry, LinkedIn’s new Salary feature might be more accurate than are other online compensation estimation tools. States are trying to pass laws that balance bereaved people’s desire to access their deceased loved ones’ social media accounts with the privacy interests of the account holders and the people… Continue Reading

Facebook signs more than $50 million worth of deals with media firms and celebrities to create videos for its live-streaming service. Tumblr is jumping on the live video bandwagon, too—but via live-streaming platform partners, not through its own service. C-Span picked up live feeds of the Democratic sit-in over gun-control legislation that representatives shot on… Continue Reading

Social media has upended a number of industries. Is Wall Street next? Facebook is getting into the video game live-streaming business. Steven Avery’s defense attorney is keeping her 163,000 Twitter followers abreast of her ongoing defense work on behalf of the “Making a Murderer” documentary subject, and some lawyers think it’s a bad idea. Five quick and… Continue Reading

Defense lawyers who checked out the Facebook page of a plaintiff suing their client can be prosecuted for attorney misconduct, New Jersey judge rules. Norwegian band changes its name to avoid “social media censorship.” Can public agencies control their employees’ social media posts? Google has complete discretion over whether or not to grant “right to… Continue Reading

Tale of the tape. The Video Privacy Protection Act (VPPA), which requires video service providers to destroy personally identifiable information after a specified time, doesn’t provide a private right of action for plaintiffs whose information was retained beyond that period. So held the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in Rodriguez v. Sony,… Continue Reading

Cisco estimates that 25 billion devices will be connected in the Internet of Things (IoT) by 2015, and 50 billion by 2020. Analyst firm IDC makes an even bolder prediction: 212 billion connected devices by 2020. This massive increase in connectedness will drive a wave of innovation and could generate up to $19 trillion in… Continue Reading

On April 12, 2013, the UK’s Office of Fair Trading (OFT), the UK regulator for consumer affairs and competition, announced that it was launching an investigation into children’s web- and app-based games. In particular, the OFT is looking into whether such games comply with the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008 (“Regulations”), and are… Continue Reading

Following concerns raised by bloggers, the UK government has clarified that small blogs will be exempt from the scope of the new UK press watchdog which is to be introduced as a result of the findings of the Leveson Inquiry. In 2007, Clive Goodman, then-editor of UK newspaper News of the World, and private investigator… Continue Reading

History is littered with examples of the law being slow to catch up with the use of technology. Social media is no exception. As our Socially Aware blog attests, countries around the world are having to think fast to apply legal norms to rapidly evolving communications technologies and practices. Law enforcement authorities in the United… Continue Reading

We’ve reported before on Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (CDA), the 1996 statute that states, “[n]o provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.” Courts have interpreted Section 230 to immunize social media and other websites… Continue Reading

The Internet and, in particular, social media have changed the landscape of federal and state jury instructions, which now prohibit jurors from conducting independent research on the Internet, from sending emails, texts, Facebook postings, tweets or other electronic communications conveying developments in a trial or in deliberations, and from using mobile cameras to record courtroom… Continue Reading

About Socially Aware

Social media sites are transforming not only the daily lives of consumers, but also how companies interact with consumers. Here at Morrison & Foerster, across all of our practice groups, we are seeing complex, cutting-edge legal issues arising out of social media. As with the Internet boom during the mid-to-late 1990s, social media is generating new legal questions at a far faster pace than the law’s ability to provide answers to such questions. In an effort to stay on top of these emerging issues, and to keep our clients and friends informed of new developments, Morrison & Foerster publishes this blog devoted to the law and business of social media.

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About MoFo

We are Morrison & Foerster — a global firm of exceptional credentials. Our clients include some of the largest financial institutions, investment banks, Fortune 100, technology and life science companies. We’ve been included on The American Lawyer’s A-List for 12 straight years, Chambers Global named MoFo its 2013 USA Law Firm of the Year, and Chambers USA named the firm both its 2013 Intellectual Property and Bankruptcy Firm of the Year. In addition, BTI named MoFo among its 2013 Brand Elite. Our lawyers are committed to achieving innovative and business-minded results for our clients, while preserving the differences that make us stronger.

The views expressed herein shall not be attributed to Morrison & Foerster, its attorneys or its clients.